The Consumer Electronics Association made it official on Thursday— the next generation of high-definition television will be known as Ultra High-Definition (Ultra HD). This category will encompass televisions in the ginormous range that offer more than eight million pixels of resolution, which is four times the resolution of the high-definition televisions currently in the marketplace.
Ultra HD will offer a resolution of 3,840 by 2,160 pixels with a minimum aspect ratio of 16:9 and the ability to carry unique Ultra HD content (requiring special inputs to avoid upconverting the higher definition image). Announced by Japanese HDTV manufacturers as the next big thing over a year ago, the “4K” high-definition display technology for the home has finally come to fruition with Ultra HD sets already available to consumers in Japan (and NHK, the Japanese company is already getting 8K resolution HDTVs ready under Super Hi-Vision name).
The naming standard is important because companies like Sony and LG are due to make a big push on Ultra over the next several months, with Sony already bringing an 84-inch Ultra HDTV to market next month for holiday-crazed early adopters, or people who simply don’t know what they’re getting into just yet (a la 3D-HD… speaking of which, yes, Ultra HD TVs are expected to be capable of showcasing your minuscule 3D-BD library). While some are saying that the increase in resolution is rather nutty considering you can only sit so far from your gargantuan HD set while your eyes have a finite resolution they can actually fixate upon and see, most Americans will gravitate to these sets once they hit the local big box store at an affordable price based solely on the perception that “bigger is better.”
Oh, and the price tag of Sony’s first Ultra HD panel? Only $24,999… order yours today!WH
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